Author Museum Operations. Museumized Relationships Between Life and Literature. A Study of the Hamsun Center, Bjerkebæk – the Home of Sigrid Undset and the Hauge Center, 2018

This research study is a sub-project of NFR 251225 - "TRAUM: Transforming Author Museums".

How does author museums and literature centres exhibit authorships and author biographies? This thesis gives an overall presentation of three different manners in doing so. The objects of research are Bjærkebæk - the home of Sigrid Undset, the Hamsun Centre and the Olav H. Hauge Centre. These three young institutions shows and thematise established authorships: one museumized author home and two centres placed outside the authors' home domain. Private homes were for a long time the outset for the establishment of public museums dedicated to authorships. This thesis shows that this is not necessarily longer the case. The thesis investigate the author museum as an alternative entrance to the reception of the individual authors. It is possible to read Undset's “Jenny” (1911) without further knowledge about the authors life, and it is also possible to read Knut Olav Åmås' biography “Mitt liv var draum” (2004) about Olav H. Hauge without knowledge about Hauges poetry. The thesis investigate how one of the museums foremost forms of communications, the exhibitions, are negotiated appearances of the authors lives and literature, and the relationship between them, by the help of material components, curated measures and exhibition technologies. Inspired by the material shifts within cultural sciences and the actor-network theory the exhibitions were analysed by letting objects be the centre of attention. The thesis arguments for a greater sensitivity for the work the objects are doing and for how the materialism influence what that is communicated in the exhibitions. The exhibitions are placing Undsets, Hamsuns and Hauges lives and authorships in a national context, in the world literature and in the local culture, or put differently: in the world. By their titles and placement, the museums demonstrate that they themselves wish to be taken seriously as communicators of the authors' lives and literature. This also means that people need to evaluate seriously how the museums are executing their work. This thesis contribute to the debate concerning the authors' lives and literature by studying how the authorships and biographies are exposed at three author museums in Norway.

For further information about ”Author Museum Operations. Museumized Relationships Between Life and Literature. A Study of the Hamsun Center, Bjerkebæk – the Home of Sigrid Undset and the Hauge Center, 2018”, please contact the principal investigator.